Prostate cancer treatments 'could be aided through new discovery'

A new discovery concerning the way in which prostate cancer can develop could lead to the development of future treatments for the disease. It was found that prostate cancer is able to develop within one type of stem cell before being maintained by a very different stem cell. This results in the cancer moving continuously through the system, making it difficult to treat.

The finding, from the University of California, Los Angeles' Eli and EdyThe Broad Center of Regenerative Medicine and Stem Cell Research, means that new treatment development could be more successful at treating prostate cancer. 

The researchers involved in the study previously reported in Science that prostate cancer is able to start within basal type stem cells. The new research adds to this, as they found that the tumours that start in this type of stem cell can then move to be maintained by luminal-like cells. This means that the area they need to target in order to treat the cancer can alter over time, making treatment more difficult.

Doctor Andrew Goldstein, one of the leaders of the research, said: "People have begun to think about cancers as being driven by stem cells in the same way that many of our adult organs are maintained by dedicated stem cells. Based on this new understanding, a lot of excitement surrounds the concept of going right to the root of the tumor and targeting those stem cells to eradicate the cancer."

The basal stem cells, in which the cancer starts, look very different from the luminal cells that maintain the cancer. In patients that are being treated for aggressive prostate cancer using anti-androgen therapy, the cells that remain after the treatment also look different from the basal and luminal cells. This means that the cells that evolve the disease as it is being treated need to be identified in order to create an effective targeting treatment.

Researchers are now looking at what elements are the same throughout each of the stem cell types that are involved in the progression of the cancer and that don't change during the evolution of the cells. It is hoped that the findings will help in the development of targeted treatments for the disease.